Allietare QAL - Bonnie Hunter announced the next QAL. I like the colors and the theme so I may give it a try! It will start at the end of next month, but it's good to have it on this list so I don't forget!! :)

I really like this project! It was the first project after the long break of last week, and I wanted something easy to sew to get me back on the horse/machine!

The initial plan was to make just a couple of pieces and connect them (the center piece) but I couldn't stop! Waaaaay tooooooo cute!! :) :) :)

I didn't follow the measures in the pattern exactly but I got the inspiration from there!

This was also the first time I ever try to make a blanket stitch by hand to use it as base for the crochet edge: I loooove this look! I see it happening again on many small pieces! Plus she says to use embroidery floss (all six strands) and I realized that's a genius idea to use the floss I really don't like for embroidery (like the variegated colors) as they will work out wonderful in a crochet border!!

I am extremely happy that last night I waved in the last piece of thread and I can call it DONE!
The quilting is plain terrible (see the point 1. above) but I cannot see it neither from a galloping horse nor from the couch :) so I am happy and proud of displaying the piece for Halloween today and later this year for Christmas!

I learned many many lessons from this piece so we can call it a success in this sense!!
--
Yesterday I also bought some new flatware... and I didn't have more those little boxes for my drawer.
So what does a crafty person do? Go to the dollar store and by more boxes? Of course NOT!
I made two boxes with fabric :)

Size: 10'' x 3'' x 2.5''

I just worked them out as I went... no pattern and few mistakes, but they just have to stay in my drawer so I don't care :) Plus I used some cute Xmas fabric so now I have a themed and cheerful flatware drawer!!

--
And last, but not least, I want to remind you that I am working on charity quilts,
and I would love your help!!

Quilts are for a quilt drive to help the kids in the DC General Homeless Shelter.

And you can help me by donating orphan blocks, partial blocks, or fabric (scraps, strips, leftover, uglies, whatever).

If you are willing to mail them to me, I could use them to make more quilts for these kids!!!

If you are up for a loving donation, please send me an email at tweloq[_at_]gmail[dot_com] or leave a comment here with your email address so I could give you my mailing address. I promise that your donation will be used to make some kids happy and feel more loved!!

I don't have finishes to report as I was hoping, but I cut several pieces for the next quilt so I guess I am back in the making!!

This year they are all in one page (which is great I think), but the page may take a while to load, so be patient!! I have two quilts (Vincent in two categories, and Flying Geese in one).

If you want to go and show them some love they would be very happy :)

This year if you refresh the page after you voted, you will see the total number of people that voted for all the entries. Mine are always in the bottom of the pile :( oh well, I like what I do even if very few other people share this with me :) and there are many more "traditional" quilts that are pretty amazing and it's obvious that they get more votes! So that's ok, that's life!

Remember that in this link party only projects belonging to the SYS2015 series should be added

(I reserve the right to delete any non compliant link).

This link party will be open all year long and you can add as many finished projects as you want!

The same link party will be shown on the SYS2015 page.

Each link will give you a chance to win one of the monthly prizes.

This month, in order to be eligible for a prize, you are required to embroider a literary quote on a piece of fabric!

I encourage you to use Jordan's quote, but if that is "not your thing", any other quote from any book will qualify as an entry!! As long as it's a finished embroidery piece!

As the first entry, you can entry the embroidery block, and for additional entries you can enter any finish (different than simply putting in a hoop or hanging it) that you come up with! Let's see what you can come up with!

You can still link up blocks and projects from the Foundation Paper Piecing, Quilting, Crochet, Pixel Quilt and Fabric Postcard tutorials!!

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Isn't this a wonderful season to make cute and spooky craft projects to decorate our homes?

If you are new around here, welcome!

If you have been here before, I am glad that you came back!!! :)

If you are new here feel free to look around and you will find tons of FREE paper piecing patterns of very famous cartoon characters! :) And do you know that I have been running a fun series of tutorials call Stretch Your Skills where every month we learn a new skill, with a simple and finished little project?!?

From Foundation Paper Piecing, to Applique, to Crochet, to Quilting, to Design and Software!!

You can download all the tutorials from the series page and there is still time to enter your projects for a final giveaway mystery prize!!

This is the project I made for the hop:

Spooky Hoopy Art

The Nightmare Before Christmas

I had this big quilting hoop for a while and it makes the perfect frame for a cute cross stitching pattern I designed from a scene of "The Nightmare Before Christmas".

If you want to make one of these for yourself, you can download the pdf pattern for the cross stitching piece below.

I had sooooo much fun making the first one (even if a little too big) that I decided that will be the detachable tree decoration I will include in many of my Xmas cards!
So I stitched up a bunch of them with thinner cotton, and I really love them!

Second project of my long Q4 list, done (project 6. on the list)!
--
Before getting sick, I was able to complete October block for the Americana QAL. A fun schoolhouse!

--
And last, but not least, I want to remind you that I am working on charity quilts,
and I would love your help!!

Quilts are for a quilt drive to help the kids in the DC General Homeless Shelter.

And you can help me by donating orphan blocks, partial blocks, or fabric (scraps, strips, leftover, uglies, whatever).

If you are willing to mail them to me, I could use them to make more quilts for these kids!!!

If you are up for a loving donation, please send me an email at tweloq[_at_]gmail[dot_com] or leave a comment here with your email address so I could give you my mailing address. I promise that your donation will be used to make some kids happy and feel more loved!!

I have to say that sadly I didn't work on this project much in the last couple of weeks as I was trying to get ahead in the QAL idea. But I think that by the end of the month I may complete another quilt and finish another top!

If you are new around here, let me just point you to my main addiction: designing and sharing for free tons of paper piecing patterns :)

As you can see from one of my old headers arrangement, I design patterns for Disney characters, Peanuts and Snoopy, Downton Abbey, Alice in Wonderland but I have many many more (Maleficent, The Simpsons, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Betty Boop, Minions and more)!! Some of them have to be tested, some of there are tested. You can find them just navigating the different tabs or just typing the character name in the search box at the top of the page.

And my other recent endeavor is SYS 2015 (Stretch Your Skills): a monthly series of tutorials to practice in different crafts skills. Until now we had Foundation Paper Piecing, Quilting, Crochet and Pixel Quilt.

If you want to know more about the series, check out the Series Page. Links to the tutorials are there... and did I mention that you can link projects for monthly prizes? Just saying... ;)

--

So let me tell you their story!

Everything started with my obsession about Van Gogh's "The Starry Night" and the amazing work of Adam Lister (adamlistergallery.com).

When I read about the AMB challenge, the use of solids (and just solids) didn't make me very excited (I don't like solids, don't hate me please :) ). However I thought that it could be the best excuse to finally put Van Gogh's painting down to fabric! But how exactly? I started googling around images of the painting and I came across Adam's wonderful "pixellated" reproductions of classic art and famous characters. As soon as I saw his version of the painting I had the moment "That's it! That's exactly what I was looking for!". I immediately got in touch with him and he was very kind and curious to see how his art would translate into fabric!

Now the difficult part: how can I reproduce this look and keep somehow the spirit of Van Gogh's irregular impressionistic look?
Raw edge applique and thread painting look the only reasonable option!
Of course I never tried any of these technique :) but luckily July tutorial of my series "Stretch Your Skills" was exactly that! So thanks to the wonderful tips and instructions by Kristel (wipgirl) I was able to make a little practice piece that gave me the confidence I needed to attach the big project!

A lot of designing, cutting, fusing and sewing later, this is what I had!

The irregular edges of the different pieces, combined with the irregular crossing of the quilting makes the piece really "impressionist" (IMHO).
I didn't want to add any distraction with the binding, so I used a pillow case method to finish it.And this mini WAS ACCEPTED in the 40 (out of 230 submitted) minis for the Road to California exhibit!!

Since I didn't have white as leftover but blues, I decided to play with the colors and this was the result. It's very simple and the quilting is random straight lines to echo the simple shapes that Mondrian is famous to paint.

This quilt was not accepted in the exhibit, but I still think it's pretty and it balances the impressionistic look of "Vincent"!

So if you happen to be in Ontario, CA in January, stop to visit this fun exhibit!

And if you see my mini, please send me a picture!!

--

If you have any comment about these quilts, I would love to hear!!!
And check out more wonderful art quilts over at blogger's quilt festival!!

If you are new around here, let me just point you to my main addiction: designing and sharing for free tons of paper piecing patterns :)

As you can see from one of my old headers arrangement, I design patterns for Disney characters, Peanuts and Snoopy, Downton Abbey, Alice in Wonderland but I have many many more (Maleficent, The Simpsons, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Betty Boop, Minions and more)!! Some of them have to be tested, some of there are tested. You can find them just navigating the different tabs or just typing the character name in the search box at the top of the page.

And my other recent endeavor is SYS 2015 (Stretch Your Skills): a monthly series of tutorials to practice in different crafts skills. Until now we had Foundation Paper Piecing, Quilting, Crochet and Pixel Quilt.

If you want to know more about the series, check out the Series Page. Links to the tutorials are there... and did I mention that you can link projects for monthly prizes? Just saying... ;)

--

Flying Geese

Size: 23'' x 23 ''

I bought the geese panel (lower left corner) on Etsy and I designed the panel on the right myself on Spoonflower. The top is applique (patterns I created from a picture). I really love how it turned out, and I think the recipient really like it, with all the inspirational and positive quotes!!

--

If you have any comment about these quilts, I would love to hear!!!
And check out more wonderful art quilts over at blogger's quilt festival!!

Remember that in this link party only projects belonging to the SYS2015 series should be added

(I reserve the right to delete any non compliant link).

This link party will be open all year long and you can add as many finished projects as you want!

The same link party will be shown on the SYS2015 page.

Each link will give you a chance to win one of the monthly prizes.

This month, in order to be eligible for a prize, you are required to embroider a literary quote on a piece of fabric!

I encourage you to use Jordan's quote, but if that is "not your thing", any other quote from any book will qualify as an entry!! As long as it's a finished embroidery piece!

As the first entry, you can entry the embroidery block, and for additional entries you can enter any finish (different than simply putting in a hoop or hanging it) that you come up with! Let's see what you can come up with!

You can still link up blocks and projects from the Foundation Paper Piecing, Quilting, Crochet, Pixel Quilt and Fabric Postcard tutorials!!

I may lay mine out all together to see how many I have because I could have enough to make myself a throw quilt for our living room. We'll see! For sure I enjoy the challenge of making blocks I never tried before!

Well, the wonderful artist that I took inspiration from (Adam Lister) told me that he likes my work so much that he wants a mini quilt for himself! :) and he offered me to trade one mini-quilt with one of his paintings! Isn't that amazing? I love when different kind of artists interact and inspire each other like that!
So he sent me a piece to use for inspiration... and I think I found the perfect way to merge his style with mine in this piece. More on this in the future!!
--

This past week I completed my project for the Stretch Your Skills series.

Despite the fact that I did embroidery before, I found ways to learn something new and to test something new (using a black fabric as background and variegated thread for the butterfly). These little projects are just perfect for testing out things that you are not too sure about, as they don't require much commitment.

This is why I really don't understand why people don't participate much (or at all) in this SYS series :( :( :(

Well, we have one last tutorial next month (English Paper Piecing) and I started putting together the project (it's hexagons, so nothing secret there ;) ).

Despite being disappointed and sad for the lack of participation in my series for this year, I decided to design and organize a new "QAL" for next year too! Because I am not giving up on trying to involve people of the community to make things along with me!

The format will be different... it's going to be a quilt, but also not a quilt... sewing but not just sewing... we will be still include many techniques and try to build skills, but in a different kind of way... well... I cannot tell you more, stay tuned for sneak peeks and teasers :) and I will announce that in late November or December.

I hope more people will join me there!

--
And last, but not least, I want to remind you that I am working on charity quilts,
and I would love your help!!

Quilts are for a quilt drive to help the kids in the DC General Homeless Shelter.

And you can help me by donating orphan blocks, partial blocks, or fabric (scraps, strips, leftover, uglies, whatever).

If you are willing to mail them to me, I could use them to make more quilts for these kids!!!

If you are up for a loving donation, please send me an email at tweloq[_at_]gmail[dot_com] or leave a comment here with your email address so I could give you my mailing address. I promise that your donation will be used to make some kids happy and feel more loved!!

I have to say that sadly I didn't work on this project much in the last couple of weeks as I was trying to get ahead in the QAL idea. But I think that by the end of the month I may complete another quilt and finish another top!

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Earlier this month Jordan shared an embroidered literary quote for a chic piece of hoop art.
You can find the tutorial on the SYS2015 page!

I made mine! Since I am pretty familiar with basic embroidery, I thought: how can I make it challenging for me to "Stretch My Skills"?

I never used a dark fabric before, so that would be fun to try!

I researched several methods to transfer the design to the fabric (since usual markers are not visible on black fabric). I don't have fancy chalk markers or pen. Many people use a water soluble stabilizer that positioned on the fabric and dissolved once all the stitching is done... but I don't have that fancy thing either. Then someone suggested using tissue paper... when I read that I though "great, another fancy kind of paper that I don't have, moving on to the next option"... but then I stopped... wait... isn't tissue paper that thing you use to wrap gifts? I DO have that at home!! :)

It's great to transfer the design as it's very very thin.

The fact that is very very thin is a good thing also when it comes down to taking it off your work when you are done.

The fact that is very very thin is not that great as you are trying to pull your work through the hoop. You have to be very delicate... and I found out that using pin to hold it in place is not good... using washable glue along the text is actually much easier...

I never tried stitching on dark fabric and I thought the thread wouldn't show up well... but I really like the contrast. I also used a variegated thread and different stitches, just for fun and I like that it's very dynamic.

Are YOU enjoying making stitching up your quotes? Share your creations below!!

Remember that in this link party only projects belonging to the SYS2015 series should be added

(I reserve the right to delete any non compliant link).

This link party will be open all year long and you can add as many finished projects as you want!

The same link party will be shown on the SYS2015 page.

Each link will give you a chance to win one of the monthly prizes.

This month, in order to be eligible for a prize, you are required to embroider a literary quote on a piece of fabric!

I encourage you to use Jordan's quote, but if that is "not your thing", any other quote from any book will qualify as an entry!! As long as it's a finished embroidery piece!

As the first entry, you can entry the embroidery block, and for additional entries you can enter any finish (different than simply putting in a hoop or hanging it) that you come up with! Let's see what you can come up with!

You can still link up blocks and projects from the Foundation Paper Piecing, Quilting, Crochet, Pixel Quilt and Fabric Postcard tutorials!!

Monday, October 12, 2015

Welcome to the big reveal of my project for the wonderful Teal Mini Swap 2015!
Beth is organizing a blog hop to highlight some of the amazing quilts and mug rugs that we have been exchanging for the swap!

First of all, if you are new around here, welcome!
If you have been here before, I am glad that you came back!!! :)
If you are new here feel free to look around and you will find tons of FREE paper piecing patternsof very famous cartoon characters! :)

And do you know that I have been running a fun series of tutorials call Stretch Your Skills where every month we learn a new skill, with a simple and finished little project?!?

From Foundation Paper Piecing, to Applique, to Crochet, to Quilting, to Design and Software!!
You can download all the tutorials from the series page and there is still time to enter your projects for a final giveaway mystery prize!!

But let's get to the project me and Linda exchanged for this swap!

(left) the project I sent to Linda, (right) what I received

I am so happy with the one I received!! I am usually not a big fan of stars since they look too traditional, but this is made with such a fun and bright mix of scraps! I absolutely love it!!! Plus the fabric she picked for the border (from a line by Paula N, Palindromes. The particular fabric is called Totem and its the Pink/Teal color palette) it's the best print I have ever seen!! So wonderful! The picture doesn't do it justice, but it's bad weather here in MD :( . And the extra goodies? So useful and pretty!!

This mini has also a story:"The center squares represent Linda and all her close friends, family and all the people her life is intertwined with. The people that help through rough times, support during hardships and share joy and excitement for the happy and successful moments in life. The border represents all the people that are far away in time and space. All those people that even if they are not physically close by, they watch us from "the windows". They are all different: some are more solid, some floral, some geometric, some gingham, some blue, some pink. But no matter how different they are, they all contribute in an harmonious way to make our life better."

I kept the little mug rug for myself, because I really loved the cathedral window and the other pattern and I had hard time letting the mini go :) so I scaled down the center block and made me a little reminder of what I made for this swap!!

During the hop, Beth will donate 30% of any pattern purchases from her online shop which feature teal fabrics in the cover quilt to OCRF. This includes almost all of them, because she loves teal: stop by and check out this great opportunity to get amazing patterns and help a good cause!

I made two minis for the challenge... and... AND... ONE WAS ACCEPTED!!!
Like WHAAAAAAAAAAT????

It's the first time I ever enter anything in any exhibit and I got in!!
I am soooooooooooo excited.

"Piet-ite Blue" and "Vincent".

So let me tell you their story!

Everything started with my obsession about Van Gogh's "The Starry Night" and the amazing work of Adam Lister (adamlistergallery.com).

When I read about the AMB challenge, the use of solids (and just solids) didn't make me very excited (I don't like solids, don't hate me please :) ). However I thought that it could be the best excuse to finally put Van Gogh's painting down to fabric! But how exactly? I started googling around images of the painting and I came across Adam's wonderful "pixellated" reproductions of classic art and famous characters. As soon as I saw his version of the painting I had the moment "That's it! That's exactly what I was looking for!". I immediately got in touch with him and he was very kind and curious to see how his art would translate into fabric!

Now the difficult part: how can I reproduce this look and keep somehow the spirit of Van Gogh's irregular impressionistic look?
Raw edge applique and thread painting look the only reasonable option!
Of course I never tried any of these technique :) but luckily July tutorial of my series "Stretch Your Skills" was exactly that! So thanks to the wonderful tips and instructions by Kristel (wipgirl) I was able to make a little practice piece that gave me the confidence I needed to attach the big project!

A lot of designing, cutting, fusing and sewing later, this is what I had!

The irregular edges of the different pieces, combined with the irregular crossing of the quilting makes the piece really "impressionist" (IMHO).
I didn't want to add any distraction with the binding, so I used a pillow case method to finish it.And this mini WAS ACCEPTED in the 40 (out of 230 submitted) minis for the Road to California exhibit!!

Since I didn't have white as leftover but blues, I decided to play with the colors and this was the result. It's very simple and the quilting is random straight lines to echo the simple shapes that Mondrian is famous to paint.

This quilt was not accepted in the exhibit, but I still think it's pretty and it balances the impressionistic look of "Vincent"!

So if you happen to be in Ontario, CA in January, stop to visit this fun exhibit!